More government mandates - stability control

Maintenance/Repairs
21

Actually, since so much of the driving public is totally ignorant of other features of their cars, I doubt that most people would even be aware that their new car has stability control if they did not have to opt for it.

Think about it:

A huge percentage of the public does not know how to react when ABS kicks in. When the pedal begins its rapid vibration, their reaction is to back off on the brakes–and that is either because they don’t know that they have ABS or they are too ignorant to know how to utilize it. And then of course, we have people who pump their brake pedals and wonder why the ABS never kicks in on slippery surfaces.

As we see almost daily in this forum, something as relatively simple as the oil pressure warning light is a mystery to a huge number of drivers. After they wind up destroying their engine, they come to this forum and belatedly find out that their car ran out of oil even though the oil pressure warning light did not come on until the point where their engine had already sustained damage from poor lubrication.

Or–how about the folks who ask how to activate or to deactivate the overdrive gear on their transmission?

There are also the people who don’t know about the presence of child-proof locks on the back doors of their car, and who are puzzled because they suddenly can’t open the doors from the inside of the car.

Then, we have the folks who state that their car has a V-4 engine.

Heck, there are lots of folks who don’t even know how to spell the make and model of the car that they are driving!

You are giving all too much credit to the typically automotively-dumb American motorist. Most will never be aware that their car has a stability control system, and as a result will not make a conscious decision to drive recklessly. A-holes have always driven recklessly, and they will continue to drive recklessly, but with the inclusion of this life-saving feature, perhaps they will kill a few less innocent people in the process.

And, then we have the fact that stability control has actually existed on cars for at least 10 years–beginning first with just a few high-end models, and subsequently being extended year by year to lower-priced models as either standard equipment or at least as an option.

By now, there are–quite literally–tens of thousands of car on the roads daily with stability control. But–where is the evidence that drivers have had more accidents as a result of this feature?

The press, which is always looking for lurid tales to tell, has never–to my knowledge–run any coverage of “spectacular crashes caused by stability control”. Trust me–if there was even a scintilla of evidence that people had died as a result of stability control, the media would be flogging that allegation non-stop. Can you produce any evidence to the contrary?

So, no–I can’t imagine the spectacular crashes that will result when the margin provided by stability control is exceeded.

22

So the next step after stability control will be GPS control. Your cars computer will have GPS and maps integrated into the stability control system to automatically take over brakes and throttle to slow the car down if it senses the car is approaching a corner too fast. The system could actually even sense moisture or ice for further refinement of the system. I guess this would be a proactive stability control system making the mandated reactive stability control obsolete before its even mandated.

23

How many posts have we seen on here asking how to turn DRLs off?

24

time until cars drive themselves: 15 years

25

Just more BS from the Feds to make up for poor driving skills. Drive your car properly, and you’ll NEVER need this technology.

26

After reading your post you basically want the car to save you when you?re doing something dumb. That is driving too fast for the road conditions.

Why should I have to pay so someone else can push it a little harder, drive a little faster, basically people need to learn to DRIVE.

Everyone seems to think it someone else?s responsibly to stop them from being stupid. Radar to stop you from driving too close to another car, what happened to watching the road Oh wait you were talking to someone with your hands free Onstar system.

Learn to drive, drive according to road conditions, pay attention. There no need for traction control, radar, or any other device to stop you from being stupid.

My opinions are subject to change with new facts.

27

VDC Driver ,I agree with most of your comments. Car owners think mechanics are stupid, car mechanics see it the opposite. Owners create a large majority of their own problems. All of you who have read your owners manual and keep it in the car raise your hand. I think safety features are good, but I propose all vehicles that have problems with these systems have their vehicles towed to a Gov. shop in Wash D.C. to have them fixed. They are just another electrical nightmare for mechanics. Right now ABS and current Traction Control systems are a common owner complaint coming to a repair shop. If people weren’t idiots, we wouldn’t even need a police force or speed limits.[ Saab made a V-4]

28

The problem is that in the case of an accident, they don’t check each system. The officer finds out that this person was driving too fast and crashed. End of story. The the traction control fail and cause an accident odds are it would be blamed on the driver.

“Really officer the car just seemed to turn to the left and I didn’t do anything.”

Look at how long it took to prove ABS really didn’t help and in fact may be causing more accidents than prevented.

So it’ll be years before we’ll really find if traction control is a benefit or not in the meantime you’ll get to pay for it and be part of a big experiment.

My opinions are subject to change with new facts.

29

Ford made a V-4 as well. The Essex V4

30

I should have said Saab used a V-4 . It was the Awstralian Ford V-4 block . It was used in the Sonnet.

31

Well, if we had video capability in this forum, you would see my hand raised as I have read my manual, periodically re-read it, and I keep it in the car. I finally shamed a friend of mine into keeping his Toyota manual in his car by asking, “Why don’t you keep the manuals for your home DVD player and your desktop computer in the car?”.

Of course Saab used a V-4. In fact, as a high school student, that was my dream car–a Saab 96 with a V-4. That gem of a little Ford engine was originally developed for Ford’s Cardinal compact car, but the car never saw production as it was red-lighted somewhere toward the end of its development cycle.

However, I very much doubt that any of the folks who have stated in this forum that they have a V-4 are actually driving one of those old Saabs or Fords. The ones to whom I referred were mostly Honda owners who had no idea whatsoever of what lies underneath their hood.

As to the durability of stability control systems, my experience has been nothing but positive. In over 8 yrs/103k miles, it has never malfunctioned and it has saved my posterior on a couple of occasions when I took a turn a bit too fast.

32

VCDdriver quote: “As to the durability of stability control systems, my experience has been nothing but positive. In over 8 yrs/103k miles, it has never malfunctioned and it has saved my posterior on a couple of occasions when I took a turn a bit too fast.” Unquote

I suggest that your driving skills and judgment capabilities may have deteriorated as I will assume that you have driven previous cars without stability control and did not need your posterior saved.

Stability control will be needed by a few but all will pay via higher car prices and yet one more motor vehicle electronic system to make trouble.

33

“I suggest that your driving skills and judgment capabilities may have deteriorated as I will assume that you have driven previous cars without stability control and did not need your posterior saved.”:

I think not.
After a couple of accidents in my younger years, owing to failure to exercise sufficient caution, I have driven for the past 39 years/well over 460,000 miles, without any accidents.
Some may equal this record, but probably not many can do so.

34

TSM, I agree w/you once again.

I’ve stated my position on these type of mandated systems before. I believe there are unintended consequences that result from these type of improvements. Cars are more capable than ever and what is the result? People always push to the limit. When brakes were lousy and acceleration limited (by comparison), people acted accordingly. You didn’t dare pull out in front of someone because you knew their brakes stunk and you couldn’t get out of their way fast enough. Now, people will pull out when you’re right on top of them knowing you can stop if necessary and they have enough horsepower and traction to pull it off. Just one example.

No matter what performance enhancement you add, a large number of people will exploit it to its limit. Add stability control? Guess what, I can take that corner at even higher speeds and the car will protect me from myself. Or will it?

Really, how many rollovers are happening anyway compared to the total number of miles being driven. Is this really a problem that needs to be addressed in this way? This is another of those “safety, no matter the cost” type of initiatives. The only thing missing is the “its for the children” statements to get people in line with the idea.

If it’s an option, fine. You can pay for it if you feel it is worthwhile. Personally, they can take stability control and the nanny state ideals of today and stick them where the sun isn’t supposed to shine.

35

While I haven’t read ALL of it, I have read a good deal of it. The thing is over 500 pages long, and it even came with a little booklet summarizing things for me in it like the dash lights and what they mean and how to use the control knobs and such. I lucked out and was able to download a PDF of the owner’s manual before I even took delivery of the car, so I knew a bit of how to operate it when I got it, though nothing beats sitting in the car and playing with it to figure it out.

36

By now, there are–quite literally–tens of thousands of car on the roads daily with stability control. But–where is the evidence that drivers have had more accidents as a result of this feature?

It’s a well-known phenomeonon…well-known enough to have its very own name…that motorists drive comparatively more cautiously in cars they perceive to be safe, and vice-versa. This was noted way back when seatbelts were mandated, and more recently with the advent of ABS: the insurers were curious why ABS didn’t decrease accident rates in the manner they expected.

(After all, how many posts have there been, here, that AWD causes motorists to drive “like nuts” in wintery weather?)

Also, I’ve read, in this thread, some very inaccurate things about what stability control can and can’t do. If Joe Motorist is giong around a curve, pulling 0.6 G, and the friction coefficient between road and tires suddenly drops to 0.2 G (that darned oil slick!), Joe Motorist is going to slide off the road: stability control does not repeal the laws of physics! However, the inevtiable result of Joe Motorist assuming the laws of physics have been repealed is more high-G maneuvers…with corresponding risk of loss of control.

Also, I’ve been “blessed” to drive a few cars with traction/stability control, and I did not like the contra-intuitive handling. (Ex: making a right turn, downhill, on a snowy road, “Okay, now the rear is going to want to break loose, so I need to be Johhny-on-the-spot, feeding in cross-control to keep the rear from fishtailing,” only to find that the car prevented me from finishing the turn once it sensed sliding–potentially dangerous if one didn’t allow for this non-standard behavior.)

37

I don’t understand how my 2:36 post showed up after a 6:53 post. Do any of you have an original owners manual from the past with less than 25 pages? The fuse box had maybe 5 or six fuses. Car manufacturers are now going to put the owners manual on a CD/DVD as they are longer than the original Guttenburg Bible. I spend so much time of my day explaining and demonstating all the gadgets on cars, as owners manuals are complicated and confusing to car owners. My old neighbor, a WWII D-Day survivor sold his Cadillac because"the car was too smart for me" Every day myself or one of my sons had to run down to his house to turn off the car alarm.He was always locking his keys in the car also. It was a self-locker.

38

Time until the first fatality from a car that failed to drive itself properly: 15 years, 7 months.

39

We had one in a portable air compressor(hard to keep running)-Kevin

40

Do you think perhaps, that people (yourself included) that opt for these systems are better then average drivers ,to begin with(no saracasm intended)?-Kevin